Wednesday, December 7, 2011

falling in love with vanilla slices at Fiorentina

It was hot, and dry and unpleasant on the recent Wednesday that the intrepid cafe crusaders headed to Fiorentina in North Perth (it's moved recently, don't you know?)

Unfortunate Fiorentina fact: they didn't have air conditioning. So we sat outside and made the best of it...

However this unfortunate fact was outweighed by their delicious cakes and ample supply of San Pellegrino and ice. As well as a delicious concept of serving their iced coffees with a side of milk- so you control how strong/weak your coffee is...

The decor was pretty funky (I'm such a sucker for a brick wall!) and the staff were friendly...

And then... there were the pastries...

...so many pastries.

So I guess I might have got carried away with taking pictures of cakes and pastries... But who can blame me, right?

The two pastries/cakes that I enjoyed the most are pictured below. Whenever we go to cafes we ask what their specialty sweet is, then we order that. At Fiorentina the staff members both chorused (at the same time) "Vanilla Slice."

Vanilla slice? I'd thought. That's pretty plain and normal, isn't it? I mean, I can get one at basically any bakery.

There are reasons why I don't tend to favour the vanilla slices of any old bakery. Mostly these reasons involve congealed gelatinous custard slabs. Really, though vanilla slice should be made with creme patissiere, which should have a light texture. Well: Fiorentina has got this down. There is not gelantinous slabbing to be found in that little cafe. Hell no. Their vanilla slice may well have been simple, but there was something lovely about that simplicity. It meant they had to get all the components right, because they were all on show, right there, all up in your taste-buds, with NOWHERE TO HIDE. And they were delicious.

And then there was this cool little strawberry sort-of-tart-thing... with a roulade base, which also had a bit of creme patisierre in the roulade, but while I was eating it I thought: HOLD THE PHONE! Did I just taste one of my personal favourite flavour combinations in this little piece of cakey goodness? Berry and basil? Holy gamoley! I loves berries with basil! And basil in a creme patisierre- what a stroke of genius! It was really interesting and a bit different and OH MY.

Look, I'm not great at writing reviews, I do know this. I just like talking about food. And Fiorentina did have quite lovely cakes. They obviously take great pride in their cakey delights. The coffee was decent (though lots of people on urbanspoon don't seem to agree!)and it is leafy and lovely outside. It wasn't the most perfect experience of my life ever...but even though it was hot as anything, I forgot about the discomfort just for a second over vanilla slice and strawberries.

But what is going ON HERE? Because it's not doing well on Urbanspoon...? Have you been to Fiorentina recently (since its moved) lovelies? What did you think?

Search This

What even is this?

The kitchen crusader is a culinary action hero. She wears her underpants under her pants. She marvels at how other superheroes could get the instructions to underpants so wrong, the name is pretty explicit in delivering a "how to guide." She is a recipe provider and a crazy piece of culinary enthusiasm.
She has two blogs:
The Capers of the Kitchen Crusader (ideas for recipes, general food-related-ramblings, eating-place-reviews/impassioned rants)
and...
Course Talk Over Dinner (dinner menu ideas, how to prep them and... menus for people with weird dietary requirements like vegetarians and people who might die if they eat wheat.)
P.S Any reviews I write reflect my personal and probably unfounded opinions. I'd love for you to listen to my rantings, but not sue me after doing so. Thank you and goodnight.